You are here

Introduction to Human Communication
Share

Introduction to Human Communication
Perception, Meaning, and Identity

Third Edition


January 2024 | 464 pages | SAGE Publications, Inc
Now published by Sage

Introduction to Human Communication, Third Edition, offers a comprehensive and balanced survey of the discipline. Susan R. Beauchamp and Stanley J. Baran show students how central successful communication is to gaining effective control over perception, meaning making, and identity. After walking students through the basics of communication theory and research, they provide tools to help students become more competent, confident, employable, and ethical communicators. A diverse array of real-world examples and practical pedagogical tools help students apply what they've learned to a wide variety of communication contexts, including mass and digital communication, media literacy, health communication, interpersonal communication, organizational communication, and intercultural communication.

This title is accompanied by a complete teaching and learning package. Contact your Sage representative to request a demo.
  • Learning Platform / Courseware
    Sage Vantage
    is an intuitive learning platform that integrates quality Sage textbook content with assignable multimedia activities and auto-graded assessments to drive student engagement and ensure accountability. Unparalleled in its ease of use and built for dynamic teaching and learning, Vantage offers customizable LMS integration and best-in-class support. It’s a learning platform you, and your students, will actually love. Learn more.
    • Assignable Video with Assessment
      Assignable video (available in Sage Vantage) is tied to learning objectives and curated exclusively for this text to bring concepts to life. Watch a sample video now.

  • LMS Cartridge: Import this title’s instructor resources into your school’s learning management system (LMS) and save time. Don’t use an LMS? You can still access all of the same online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site. Learn more.
 
The Communication Process: Perception, Meaning, and Identity
 
Communication Research and Inquiry
 
Verbal Communication
 
Nonverbal Communication
 
Listening
 
Relational and Conflict Communication
 
Communicating in Small Groups
 
Organizational Communication
 
Intercultural Communication
 
Mass Communication
 
Media Literacy
 
Social Media and Personal Communication Technologies
 
Persuasion and Social Influence
 
Health Communication
 
Public Speaking: An Overview

Supplements

Instructor Resource Site
For additional information, custom options, or to request a personalized walkthrough of these resources, please contact your sales representative.

LMS cartridge included with this title for use in Blackboard, Canvas, Brightspace by Desire2Learn (D2L), and Moodle

The LMS cartridge makes it easy to import this title’s instructor resources into your learning management system (LMS). These resources include:
  • Test banks
  • Editable chapter-specific PowerPoint® slides
  • Sample course syllabi
  • Lecture notes
  • All tables and figures from the textbook
Don’t use an LMS platform?

You can still access the online resources for this title via the password-protected Instructor Resource Site.
Key features
NEW TO THIS EDITION:
  • The new edition is available in Sage Vantage, an intuitive learning platform that integrates quality Sage textbook content with assignable multimedia activities and auto-graded assessments to drive student engagement and ensure accountability. Unparalleled in its ease of use and built for dynamic teaching and learning, Vantage offers customizable LMS integration and best-in-class support. Learn more.
  • Updated examples, references, and scholarship reflect the latest developments and research in the field. Up-to-date, relevant lessons are designed to strengthen connection to the world and sharpen critical thinking skills.
  • Renewed focus and commitment given to examples and discussion of DEI. Topics covered include active listening in intercultural communication settings, cross-cultural nonverbal communication, and exercising leadership in multicultural settings.
  • Touches on how COVID-19 pandemic affected all aspects of communication and future ramifications.
  • Updated Health Communication chapter includes discussion of new therapeutic communication, the application of AI and machine learning to better health, and the topics of health inequity, digital data and reproductive choice, and video-based contactless health monitoring.
  • Revamped Organizational Communication chapter offers a new examination of organizational culture in the remote work era and a discussion of speaking about and considering DEI in work settings.
  • Updated Mass Communication chapter investigates the ethics of artificial intelligence (AI) journalism.
KEY FEATURES:
  • Ethical Communication features present ethical dilemmas that communicators face, prompting students to examine complex situations and weigh their own choices. Topics covered include lying, whistleblowing, and advertising to children.
  • Personally Responsible Communication features reminds students that they are what they communicate, asking them to consider their responsibility in personal communication situations. Topics covered include speaking inclusively, practicing active listening when cultures differ, and self-diagnosing an addition to smartphones.
  • Socially Responsible Communication features asks students to consider how much responsibility they have to the larger culture, encouraging more thoughtful communication. Topics covered include stereotyping, the adultification of childhood, and dealing with fake news on social media.
  • Communication in the Workplace features present direct, hands-on advice for career success. Topics covered include dealing with on-the-job conflict, tips for successful teamwork, and the dos and don'ts of workplace persuasion.
  • Challenge Yourself features offer student self-analyses, allowing them to put the chapter's lessons into action and judge for themselves their level of communication competence.

Chapter 1, The Communication Process: Perception, Meaning, and Identity, and Chapter 2, Communication Research and Inquiry, while maintaining the text’s foundation in communication as a social science, have been updated and reinforced with contemporary examples and recent research.

Chapter 3, Verbal Communication, offers a discussion of changing norms around pronouns.

Chapter 4, Nonverbal Communication, introduces topics such as implicit bias, micro-expressions, cross-cultural nonverbal communication, and the controversy surrounding wearing of the burka.

Chapter 5, Listening, discusses active listening in intercultural communication settings.

Chapter 6, Relational and Conflict Communication, adds a section on mastering the soft skills at work.

Chapter 7, Communicating in Small Groups, expands its discussion of leadership styles, discusses exercising leadership in multicultural settings, and the value of cultural and emotional intelligence.

Chapter 8, Organizational Communication, looks at organizational culture in the remote work era, and in work settings, speaking DEI.

Chapter 9, Intercultural Communication, discusses what it means to be an anti-racist and how to make DEI a personal, rather than simply an organizational value.

Chapter 10, Mass Communication, investigates the ethics of artificial intelligence (AI) journalism.

Chapter 11, Media Literacy, presents the media literacy issues involved in producing user-generated content.

Chapter 12, Social Media and Personal Communication Technologies, investigates the privacy paradox, location-based identity and the spatial self, Dunbar’s number, and looks at passive aggression in e-mails, when face-to-face might be better that digital when at work, how to identifying and combat fake news/disinformation, and the importance of Black Twitter.

Chapter 13, Persuasion, expands its discussion of inoculation theory using the concept of prebunking online disinformation.

Chapter 14, Health Communication, discusses therapeutic communication, the application of AI/machine learning to better health, and the topics of health inequity, digital data and reproductive choice, and video-based contactless health monitoring.

Chapter 15, Public Speaking, offers public speaking advice for non-Native English speakers as well as presentation hints for public speaking in the Zoom era and investigates the problem of AI plagiarism.